


Retrograde

by LexiTheDoubleedge



Category: Parahumans Series - Wildbow
Genre: F/F, Implied/Referenced Incest, Lesbian Sex, No girl penis, but not a lot of it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-05
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2020-04-08 08:36:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 5,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19103545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LexiTheDoubleedge/pseuds/LexiTheDoubleedge
Summary: Annette and Zoe are having a party to introduce Zoe's girls to Taylor...'s penis.That plan goes out the window quickly enough when Taylor shows up without one, but where do they go from there?





	1. Part 2 - Cognitive Dissonance

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Motherly Care](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18137675) by [WestOrEast](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WestOrEast/pseuds/WestOrEast). 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story is based on WestOrEast's Motherly Care, diverging early during chapter 2 of that story.
> 
> As usual, I'm taking the setup and going off and doing different themes with it. But you should be used to that, since you're reading Worm porn.

“Why don’t you go show Emma your new swimsuit as well?” Annette asked, smiling.

Taylor looked at her in confusion. Her swimsuit was her _old_ swimsuit, one that Emma had seen plenty of times before. Then Annette leaned down and whispered what she was thinking into her ear.

Taylor turned the most adorable shade of red. She looked at her mom, looked at Emma, and then looked back at her mom. Then she jerkily nodded and started off towards the Barnes house, her limbs moving stiffly.

***

Taylor was nearly panting with relief as she entered the Barnes household. Air conditioning, truly the greatest of humanity's works. She really had been looking forward to spending time with Emma today, but wished that it hadn't gotten quite -this- hot. There was only one thing she really needed before she could think about going back outside... well, -without- her swimsuit.

And there it was, like an oasis in the desert. A tall glass of crystal clear water, just a hint of condensation on the glass telling her how cool it was. It was so exactly what Taylor needed right now that she didn't stop to think that whoever poured it had probably meant it for themselves. She just grabbed it and drank it down without hesitation.

Taylor had just put the glass down and started heading for the bathroom when she stumbled. A wave of dizziness passed over her, and she just barely managed to stagger over to a chair before blacking out.

***

Emma looked over at her home with a pensive expression, and not for the first time in the past few minutes. Finally, it got to be too much for her. "Doesn't it seem like Taylor's been gone a really long time?"

Annette frowned. It really shouldn't have taken Taylor this long just to change into her swimsuit (and even less time to change into nothing at all).

Without really having waited for an answer, Emma announced "I'm going to go check on her!" and marched inside.

Time passed, and neither of them came out, and Annette was starting to get a bit worried.

"Emma would have come and gotten us if something was wrong," Zoe said reassuringly. "It's probably just me winning our bet."

Annette stuck her tongue out at that, but relaxed a bit.

***

The noise of the door banging woke Taylor up.

Wow, that had been weird. Had she really just fallen asleep while she was supposed to be visiting a friend? And she'd had the weirdest dream too. That's what it had to be, since she was sure she'd be able to tell without even looking if she had any kind of penis, let alone the obnoxiously gigantic one that the dream had suggested. At some point in the future she was probably going to kind of wonder what the whole thing said about her, even if she got the impression that her dream self hadn't -enjoyed- it very much.

Then Emma came into view, and Taylor realized that whatever else she'd dreamt, that startlingly skimpy bikini was real. She thought she might be getting a bit wet just thinking about it.

"Taylor?" Emma asked. "Are you all right?"

"I think so," Taylor replied. "The heat was probably just getting to me, but I should be fine now."

Emma nodded. "Do you want to come up to my room to change?" Not that there weren't places Taylor could change down here, but Emma was still a bit worried and wanted to stay close to Taylor.

"Okay." As the two went up the stairs, Taylor sniffed the air a bit before asking, "Emma, did you start using a new perfume?" Though she wasn't sure she liked whatever the smell was.

"Nope." Emma shook her head. She'd actually wondered if Taylor was the source of the smell, but apparently not. "Besides, it'd be pretty silly to put on perfume when we're going to be in the pool, right?"

"I guess."

When they got upstairs and Taylor started undressing, Emma could see that her chest had filled out noticeably since the last time she'd visited. Taylor's breasts certainly weren't huge, and still quite a bit smaller than Emma's own, but the difference was still significant. It just hadn't been obvious with how loose her top was.

Really, Emma thought Taylor probably needed to start wearing a bra at this point.

Then Taylor pulled her suit out of the bag she'd been carrying, and the real trouble began.

"Isn't that the same suit I've seen you wear before?" Emma asked.

"Yeah. I don't know why mom said it was new." Not that her stupid perverted dreams didn't have ideas on the subject, but that would just be -insane-, so Taylor was ignoring it.

Emma frowned. "I don't think that'll fit you anymore. Not with how much you've... -developed- recently."

Taylor looked down at herself and blinked. She had something resembling a bosom. When had that happened?

Emma, in the meantime, had turned and started digging through her closet. "I think I've got a suit that will work for you somewhere in here..."

After a few minutes of shoving things around interspersed with mumbling about how she really needed to get things better organized in here, Emma made a pleased "ah!" noise and pulled out a hanger. The white two-piece hanging on it was far less daring than the one she was wearing (not that she was sure what would be -more- daring and still qualify as a workable piece of swimwear), but it had adjustable ties that should let it fit Taylor just as well as it had Emma.

When Emma turned around, she was startled to realize that Taylor had gotten completely nude in the time she'd been searching, and had been waiting for her with apparent unconcern. Her friend had apparently gotten much less body-shy since the last time they'd gone swimming together.

Taylor took the suit and started putting it on, and it became obvious to Emma that she'd chosen right. The suit would fit Taylor, and it'd look fantastic on her.

If she could only get the ties done properly. The bottom had already fit well enough, but the top...

After the third time it came untied and threatened to fall off of her as soon as she shifted around a bit, Taylor managed to get the knots to at least stick. But they looked a bit lopsided to Emma, and she could tell from the look on Taylor's face that the top was pulling on her chest in a way that she didn't particularly like.

Taylor sighed. "Emma, can you help me get this tied right? This obviously isn't working for me."

"Uh... sure!" Emma said, and stepped forward, even though privately she was feeling a little nervous. She did her best not to cop a feel in the process, but it was impossible to completely avoid brushing against Taylor's skin as she made sure the top wouldn't be too tight before doing up the knots, and she could hear Taylor's breathing quicken whenever she made contact. Emma felt like her face was probably getting redder than her hair by now.

And then Taylor moaned.

Emma looked up and saw that Taylor was sporting a blush to match her own. And the bottom of the suit Emma was loaning her had a noticeable damp spot.

Taylor almost leapt away from Emma before plopping down noisily on her friend's bed. "I'm sorry. I know you're just trying to help and I shouldn't be getting turned on, but first I saw you in that bikini and then you started touching me and..." She hunched down a bit, trying to avoid looking at Emma. "I'm sorry."

Emma sat down next to Taylor (with a bit more decorum than the other girl had managed) and pulled her into a hug. "It's okay, Taylor. I don't think I'd like anyone else seeing me in this," she said. Actually, she was still surprised her mom had even been willing to contemplate her wearing something like this. But her mom had become startlingly liberal about some things recently. It was one thing for her to say it was fine and normal for her to masturbate, but to actually buy her sex toys out of the blue like that?

"But knowing that you like it," Emma continued, "... it's turning me on too."

Taylor looked up at Emma with wide eyes, that shortly went half-lidded as her friend slid a hand underneath her borrowed suit and began gently squeezing one of her breasts. Almost without conscious thought, she reached up and pulled Emma into a kiss.

***

It was significantly later when Emma and Taylor came back outside. Emma immediately went for the food, having apparently become ravenously hungry while they were inside, but Taylor didn't do much more than nibble at it all afternoon. She still professed to Zoe that everything was delicious, she just wasn't that hungry today.

Several things had become obvious to Annette within a very short period of time.

One, her daughter and Emma had definitely had sex, and both of them seemed very pleased about it.

Two, Taylor may not have arrived with a new suit, but she'd acquired one at some point.

Three, there was no way that suit could be hiding a penis, which meant that her daughter didn't have one.

Usually that last was rather implied by the "daughter" part, but that hadn't been the case for her daughter for a while now, and the conflict between her memories and the evidence of her senses was leaving her rather nonplussed. As it was Zoe, judging by the look on her face.

The three younger girls went on to have a great deal of fun swimming and playing around that afternoon (and if some of the touches between two of them tended to linger, no one else felt a great need to comment on that). The two adults, meanwhile, did their best to get into the spirit of things, but both were a bit too distracted trying to figure out what had happened.

***

Taylor woke up in the middle of the night and felt a sudden craving for a glass of milk.

She went down to the kitchen, pulled the first jug out of the shelf in the door, took the lid off, sniffed, and nearly gagged. This one had obviously gone bad. She emptied it out in the sink, rinsed the jug out, and put it with the other recyclables before opening a new one.

***

A couple days later, Annette started going into withdrawal...


	2. Part 3 - Apophenia

Annette gently eased open the door to her daughter's room.

She wasn't quiet enough.

"nmph... mom? 's something wrong?" Taylor mumbled, still half-asleep.

"Just wanted to make sure you were alright before I went to bed," Annette lied unhesitatingly.

Even from the door and with the lights off it was obvious what Taylor continued to not have.

"hmmm... good night mom."

"Good night, sweetie."

***

What followed was, if not the worst several weeks of Annette Hebert's life, at least made for serious competition for the title.

Part of that was simply the physiological symptoms of withdrawal. She had been consuming a quite startling quantity of psychoactive chemicals, and then she'd stopped, and her body was quite determined to punish her for the transgression.

Annette's self-control was too great for her to displace it into a new addiction, as some did, whether to alcohol, tobacco, or another drug. And depending on things, that could be... especially bad. So she pretty much just suffered. She woke at irregular intervals and regained little vigor from sleeping. She overate, far more than might be expected if... She felt strange, random pains with no apparent cause, and her sinuses seemed to be constantly going crazy.

And then there was the mental aspect.

Phallusy, at least, was definitely real. The PRT's website had an advisory posted about him. While he didn't match up to the likes of Bonesaw or Nilbog for "world's most reviled biotinkers", he was definitely a person of concern, and there was a significant quantity of information available about him and his work. If Taylor really had been affected, the authorities would probably be considerably agitated by the fact that her condition hadn't been reported to them.

The most important piece of information from Annette's point of view was that no one just recovered from the effects of the virus. Certain medical procedures could simplify various aspects of dealing with it, but the only true cure was parahuman healing, and healers were rare.

And that meant that Taylor must have never had the virus. Annette had imagined every last second of it. She certainly hadn't gotten pregnant by her own daughter.

And what did it say about her as a person that she'd imagined such things about her child?

That, at least for a while, she'd kept going back to her daughter's room, still longing for a taste of something that didn't exist, that never existed?

Still, there was one major problem with that whole idea. If what Annette was going through wasn't the result of withdrawal from Taylor's semen, then what -was- doing this to her?

Annette couldn't bring herself to ask Taylor or Zoe what they remembered. If it was her imagination, what would they think of her? And if it had been real... She didn't know which would be worse. And so she just bottled up all of her concerns and her confusion and stewed over it.

Through it all Taylor did her best to take care of her mother, unhesitating and uncomplaining, showing the same level of concern and care that Annette remembered showing her daughter during her own ordeal, albeit manifesting in an entirely different way. The contrast was almost enough to make her sick even as she felt renewed pride in her child.

And little by little, Annette got better.

***

As was so often the case, it was a small thing that finally revealed the truth.

Annette had been checking something on her phone, and happened to glance through her photo gallery.

She'd taken pictures.

Some had been clinical in nature, some obscene - or maybe it'd be more accurate to say some were particularly obscene.

Annette decided then and there that it was, in fact, much worse to have actually been raping your daughter in her sleep than it was merely to have imagined it.

And that also meant that she hadn't imagined her and Zoe being pregnant. Which meant that it wasn't over. The modifications almost always bred true. She wasn't sure she could bring herself to have an abortion, but if she did not... what kind of fate awaited them all, years into the future?

She crawled back into bed and pulled the sheet up over her head. No matter that it wasn't even four in the afternoon, she wasn't ready to deal with the world right now.

***

It was shortly after midnight when Annette woke up, feeling a sudden, perfectly clear understanding of what she needed to do.

With a smile on her face and a song in her heart, she got up and headed for the kitchen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> displace it into a new addiction - Addiction replacement is a real thing, though I became aware of it via a mention in another Worm fanfic. (Save the Bay.)
> 
> then what -was- doing this to her? - I'm pretty sure I've read about a thing where people who are convinced that they are sick actually manifest symptoms from nowhere, but I can't remember the name. Anyway, Annette's not thinking of that and definitely not experiencing it. That'd be an entirely different sort of story.
> 
> raping your daughter - Annette is assigning herself a degree of culpability that I personally would not due to the way I've interpreted the events of the original story.


	3. Part 4 - Cathexis

The sun was up, but it was nonetheless significantly earlier than Zoe Barnes really wanted to be up and awake.

Unfortunately, whoever was repeatedly pounding their doorbell didn't seem to get the hint, so up she was and ready to give that person a piece of her mind.

But all thoughts of yelling were torn from her mind when she yanked the door open and saw Annette on the other side. And boy, did she look terrible. Her clothes had obviously been slept in and were covered in mysterious stains. One sleeve actually appeared to be -burnt-. And there was a strange, manic look on her face that was only emphasized by her oddly and unevenly shrunken pupils.

"Anne? What's going on?" Zoe asked. "Are you all right?" Zoe was pretty sure Annette was -not- all right, but that didn't seem like the thing to say.

Focused on Annette's face, Zoe didn't notice her popping the cap off a test tube that was full of a pale blue liquid that an observer might say was actually glowing a bit.

Zoe definitely noticed when Annette shoved her back against the wall and forced her to swallow said liquid.

Her purpose accomplished, Annette seemed to come back to herself, her eyes returning to normal. "zoe?" she mumbled, "what's going on? ... don't feel so good..." And then she stumbled and would have fallen to the ground were it not for Zoe's quick grab.

"What the hell is going on?" Zoe asked herself as she dragged her friend's unconscious form inside and closed the door.


	4. Part 5 - Sublimation

Zoe carefully set Annette down on the bed in their guest room while Emma, who had been awoken by the commotion, looked on with worry. (Anne, the lucky sluggard, had managed to sleep through it.)

"Is Aunt Anne going to be okay?" Emma asked.

"I don't know," Zoe replied, equally concerned. She wasn't even sure -what- was wrong with her friend at this point.

And what the hell had Anne fed her before she passed out, anyway?

Then Emma's phone rang. She ran back to her room to answer it, and Zoe listened to her daughter's side of the conversation from the hall.

"Hi Taylor. ... Yeah, your mom is here. How'd you know?"

***

Taylor had woken up and gone down to the kitchen to have breakfast, only to find that the kitchen wasn't really there anymore.

Instead, what was obviously a tinker's laboratory had taken it's place. Taylor could recognize where several of the appliances had been disassembled for parts, and she saw the box for her old chemistry set off to one side, but she didn't really know what any of it was -now- and was afraid to go any further into the room.

But she could follow with her eyes a certain overall flow to the madness, at least enough to identify the endpoint. Which looked like some kind of elaborate distillation apparatus that then fed into a rack with spaces for two test tubes.

One side was labelled "Annette" and had a mostly-empty tube lying next to it.

The other side was labeled "Zoe".

***

"Lucky guess," Taylor replied dryly.

She plopped down on the couch and sighed, thinking about what the mess in the kitchen meant. And what it might imply for the rest of them.

"Emma, can you put your mom on for me? I think we need to go to the PRT."

***

Out of consideration for the products of multiple biotinkers being involved, both Heberts and the entire Barnes family were brought in with full biohazard precautions.

Out of consideration for a recent trigger being in that group that they hoped would be friendly, they were also brought in with full identity protection precautions.

The former complicated the latter considerably, but they managed.

Once that was accomplished, testing was able to determine a few relevant facts.

Taylor had, in fact, been a victim of the Phallusy virus, something the PRT was not best pleased had not been brought to their attention at an earlier date. Not only was she no longer suffering from it's effects now (that much was obvious), there was no chance of a resurgence in the future - whatever had reversed it had also completely wiped out any remaining reservoirs of the virus within her body. This was met with much greater approval, if a certain degree of puzzlement, since Annette was adamant that Taylor's recovery had come -before- she'd triggered.

Though she did express both a belief that given time she -could- make such a cure and the the desire to do so.

Annette and Zoe were both pregnant with Taylor's children. That was concerning. Neither showed any of the biochemical markers of Phallusy's influence, which still left concerns, but of a much more manageable scope. That, at least, Annette was willing to take some credit for, even if she no longer remembered some key parts of -how- she'd done it.

The remaining members of the Barnes family showed lingering traces of their exposure to Taylor, directly or indirectly, but none were dangerous or endangered as a result. Anne had been suffering a bit of withdrawal of her own, but thanks to her much more limited exposure had managed to get away with just a tendency to sleep excessively that should go away soon.

With those things determined, the biohazard precautions could be dispensed with, allowing them to focus on the other side of things...

***

There were certain words Emily Piggot did not like hearing in conjunction with new Protectorate or Wards members.

One of those words, if not the one topping the list, was "biotinker".

However, even she had to admit that the results of Annette Hebert's initial testing, both power and psychological, was promising. Her specialty of "medicine" was slightly broader than the word might make it sound, but had the potential to be of great value to the ENE region if not the entire organization, and did not generally lend itself to abuse. She had neither the need nor the desire to perform harmful experiments on humans, and did not produce self-replicating organisms. A drive to counter the effects of other parahuman abilities on the human body, particularly of other biotinkers, was if anything a positive.

In short, she was about as benign as a biotinker could possibly be.

It helped, in Emily's opinion, that the woman had triggered as an adult, when her beliefs and moral compass were already well established. She appreciated her powers - and understandably so - but they did not shape her in the way that teenaged or younger triggers were by theirs. It made her much easier to work with. Sadly, adult triggers were all too rare.

***

"My mom, the superhero." Taylor laughed. "I've heard that's how all little girls are supposed to think of their moms, but looks like I get the real thing."

Annette shrugged, with a smile. It was true, after all.

"So what are they going to call you?" Taylor asked.

"It took a while, but we decided on Panacea," Annette replied. "And before you ask, my costume isn't going to be that exciting, since I'll be working purely in the backline. Not really much need to impress or intimidate people if I'm in a lab all the time."

"The goddess of universal health?" Taylor asked. "At least no one's going to worry that your ego hasn't made it through intact."

Annette laughed herself. Even if she had been inclined to take issue with such things (and she wasn't), it was too much of a relief that Taylor felt comfortable enough to tease her like that after everything that had happened. "It's actually supposed to refer to the idea of a universal medicine, but hey, you're the one who said I'm Supermom."

Neither of the two was under any illusions that they were back to their old balance yet... but they had plenty of reason to hope.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So someone beat Amy to her cape name... what can a certain bio striker use now?
> 
> No, seriously, I'm asking you. I need a name to use in the final chapter and I don't know what to do. (Note: Since posting this on QQ, I picked something via poking around on Wikipedia.)


	5. Part 1 - Edargorter

Annette liked it when her daughter visited her workshop.

For a variety of reasons, it couldn't happen too often, but sometimes even the possibility seemed to help keep her focused. Admittedly, the occasional fugue was good for advancing her skills and techniques. But since she worked exclusively in consumables, it was usually better to be able to keep her mind clear and on the job of the day.

Especially today, when she'd just finished up something that was very important to her.

"So what's this one do?" Taylor asked, carefully staying outside the safety lines marked around the equipment.

Panacea's latest concoction wasn't really much to look at. Most of the medicines she made came in colors ranging from the exciting to the garish (and the less said about some of the textures, the better), but this one was perfectly clear and smooth. "It's designed to safely reverse the effects of certain viral-based physical transformations."

Taylor raised an eyebrow. "'Certain', huh?"

"While I will admit to having a particular interest in tearing down a certain tinker's works, he is not the only one using such techniques," Panacea replied primly.

Taylor shrugged, conceding the point. "Picked out a name yet?" The PRT had a habit of picking out it's own (-incredibly- boring) names for the things her mom made, but between them they usually came up with something more interesting to call each one. Annette usually came up with mythological references, while Taylor favored video game inspired names. (Well, Taylor favored the mythological references too, but her mom usually came up with them first, so she decided to look elsewhere for inspiration.)

"I was thinking of calling it... Retrograde."

***

Panacea was rather nonplussed when the first Retrograde sample disappeared from PRT custody while being transferred to a testing facility.

However, she wasn't particularly worried either. Now that she knew the method, she could make more, after all. And how much trouble could someone really get up to with a drug that didn't do anything but reverse transformations?


	6. Part 6 - Epilogue 1: Some Things Just Aren't Meant To Not Be

_X Months Later..._

Things had sort of settled down since mom joined the Protectorate.

Only to get turned upside down again when my new little sister and equally new "cousin" were born. (Who were technically my daughters, but it was best to avoid even thinking about that most of the time. For their safety, and my sanity.) But it was a refreshingly normal sort of upside down. And the Protectorate had excellent maternity benefits, so that helped.

Mom hadn't actually completely stopped tinkering at any point, of course. Bad idea, never ends well. She'd slowed down a lot though, and was only now starting to get back to her original pace. With a lot of babysitting help from me, Emma, Anne, and Aunt Zoe of course. Though mom had to spend her share of time babysitting Karen too. It was only fair.

Or at least, that's what mom said. Personally I thought she just didn't want to be denied her chances to coo over Zoe's youngest. She was welcome to it as far as I was concerned. Not that I didn't like Karen and Aveline, or go into cuteness overload around them sometimes... I just wish it didn't come with diaper duty.

(Don't ask me where mom pulled "Aveline" out of, it was just what she came up with after everyone told her it'd be too confusing to name her "Zoe".)

Today, however, I was spared that. Instead, I was at the mall with Emma.

Admittedly shopping was never going to make it to my list of top three fun time activities either, even if the family financial situation (and thus, my allowance) being more secure made it a little more enjoyable. Thankfully, Emma understood that, and was pretty good at not pushing me too hard.

Emma... there was another issue that hadn't quite been resolved.

I'd kind of like to say we'd 'pulled back' since that day when things changed, but it'd be a lie. Our parents had collectively agreed, in one of the most embarrassing events of my life (that I can recall), that as long as we kept it to my room or Emma's that there was no intrinsic reason why we shouldn't have sex if we both wanted to. Somehow I felt like that really shouldn't be right, but that didn't really stop us from giving both our beds regular workouts. (Mine was usually better for privacy, Emma's was more comfortable.)

But the whole thing had still started in kind of a weird way. Neither of us had even thought of ourselves as interested in other girls, then suddenly we're getting turned on by each other in swimsuits? Something strange was definitely going on there.

Still, we'd long since been cleared of any chemical influences on our thoughts. Even if that day wasn't really 'us', what we'd done since was. But... I'd had my share of fantasies about falling in love. I still had them, even if they'd become more lurid and sometimes involved other girls. And I didn't think I was in love with Emma. We were still just best friends, though I wouldn't call that a mere consolation prize.

Best friends who openly appreciated each other's bodies and were sometimes quite vigorous in showing that appreciation.

It felt like that should change things more than it had, and I hadn't quite decided how I felt about it yet.

While I'd been getting introspective, I'd also been following Emma around one of the smaller stores (which bore the slightly odd-sounding name of "Natural Puppy") while I tried on tops for her in her mind. This consisting of me standing there while she held different items up in front of me, and then setting them back down most of the time. Not being asked to -actually- try on too many items went a long ways towards improving the experience for me, and she was actually pretty good at finding things that both looked nice and were comfortable enough that I'd actually wear them.

And that's when I heard a sound that, like most Brockton Bay natives, I found far too familiar.

Gunfire.

Emma and I both turned and started running for the back of the store. Get as far from the entrance as possible, try to get behind cover, stay down as much as possible.

We didn't make it.

We'd grabbed each other's hands as we came around a rack, so I felt it immediately when Emma stopped running.

When Emma was shot.

I ran into something, and we both fell to the floor. I pulled back a bit to try and see how Emma was hurt, and immediately regretted it. I just didn't know enough to tell exactly what Emma's injury was, just that it looked bad, and she seemed to be having trouble breathing.

She needed immediate medical care.

She wasn't going to get it.

Not while there was a gang attacking the mall.

My best friend was dying in my arms.

And there wasn't a single thing I could do about it.

[DESTINATION]

***

"Taylor? Are you all right?" Emma asked.

I blinked.

My shirt was still soaked with Emma's blood.

But her injuries were gone.

I didn't even have to look. I just knew.

Emma was as healthy as I could possibly make her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I obey the letter of the law, if not the spirit.
> 
> As it were.
> 
> In theory.
> 
> Usually.
> 
> And that's why I said "a certain bio striker" instead of "she".
> 
> Natural Puppy - One of the brands that shows up in The World Ends With You.


	7. Part 7 +/- Epilogue 2: Sort of Like That All Along

Things after I joined the Wards were... weird. Yeah, let's call it that.

I didn't actually work with the main group all that much. Yeah, we'd spend time together off duty and things like that, but as the 'squishy healer' I couldn't really go into the field with them, and no one really wanted me tied up with console duty either.

Instead I spent most of my time at hospitals. I wouldn't do anything with brains, which came up unfortunately often with concussions if nothing else. But there wasn't much else that could cause me trouble, just some things that took longer or couldn't be done all in one sitting.

Once I'd gotten used to that they even started bringing in people with serious long-term issues from outside the immediate area, which had been fun. I got to see all kinds of interesting injuries and diseases that way. Although even that was starting to become a bit routine.

The part that really threw me sometimes though was how quickly my abilities had overshadowed mom's. Yeah, I was Feronia, the miracle healer, who could treat anything just by touching someone. Hah, it's not quite that simple, but... yeah, I could treat things that Panacea couldn't, and I didn't need the prep time she did. Some days I was far more impressed by how she could make her cures in advance, bottle them up, and ship them around to be used in places she wasn't.

("Feronia"? Well, I'd wanted Aceso, but PR said mom and I should avoid having names that were too closely related, given that we actually -were- related. I'd rejected a lot of the medical terminology that was suggested on principle. Even the archaic terms might be confusingly similar to other things people might be saying in a medical context - an emergency room is no place for an impromptu "who's on first" routine. And the ones that didn't have that problem were usually pretty insulting in a modern context. I had to endure my own round of ego jokes with what I'd picked in the end, but at least it wasn't from the exact same cultural tradition as Panacea. Deity names were pretty common among healer capes anyway, so I shouldn't stand out.)

It was still really weird to have a higher security clearance and be in on more secrets than my mom, the senior cape in every respect, was. But that's what I get for being able to sense the biology of anything and anyone I touched. Just the medical privacy issues alone were a pain, and then when they figured out I could actually recognize people by touch, including capes out of costume? I'd had to sit through a lot of extra lectures on the unwritten rules after that.

And then there were days like today, where the PRT had gotten a bee in it's collective bonnet over something and stuck me on a high-speed transport to I-don't-know-where to heal I-don't-know-who. The first time someone even tried to redact the actual medical information from the paperwork I was given. Thankfully I'd been able to explain how absolutely -stupid- that was, and they'd stopped that. Mostly. It didn't always matter, but it helped being able to think ahead if I'd need additional resources to deal with a problem.

Today's paperwork was pretty redaction-happy. I had a first name, but I wasn't even sure from that if they were male or female. Younger than me, which was a bit unusual. No last name, no location. Victim of an interrupted tinker fugue. Currently stable, but... well, from reading the chart it'd almost be more accurate to call them "partially disassembled" than "injured". At that point I'd stopped and asked who the tinker was, because that seemed like it could be important in telling me what I had to deal with.

They told me.

Well fuck.

Probably the weirdest thing on the chart given their youth was that they had existing cybernetics that I was supposed to leave alone. That was fine with me, I couldn't really do much with artificial structures in the body except remove them or leave them alone. But it was weird that someone that young would have anything like that in the first place.

***

When I arrived, the answer to one of my questions became immediately obvious. My patient was a girl.

A startlingly small girl at that. The stuff she had installed in her was stunting her growth. Long-term that was going to be a problem, but there wasn't much I could do about it.

As I got started on putting her back together, there was something bugging me. She looked familiar, which really shouldn't be the case. Of all the capes (because yeah, she was one) I knew, I could only think of one who was a little blonde girl, and this definitely wasn't Vista.

...

Wait a minute.

***

"WHY THE FUCK DO YOU HAVE ME HEALING -BONESAW-?!?"

***

And that's how I ended up with an even more higher-than-my-mom security clearance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's a math joke.


End file.
